Note 277 — Chapter IX · L. ATTIUS—HIS TRAGEDIES AND FRAGMENTS—OTHER WORKS—TRAGEDY DISAPPEARED WITH HIM—ROMAN THEATRES—TRACES OF THE SATIRIC SPIRIT IN GREECE—ROMAN SATIRE—LUCILIUS—CRITICISMS OF HORACE, CICERO, AND QUINTILIAN—PASSAGE QUOTED BY LACTANTIUS—LÆVIUS, A LYRIC POET.

The etymology of σίλλοι is unknown. Casaubon derived the word from σιλλαίνειν, to scoff. The probability, however, is that the substantive is the root of the verb. The invention of the Silli has been ascribed by some to Xenophanes, the philosopher of Colophon. He was the author of a didactic poem, and his invectives were directed against the absurd and erroneous doctrines of his predecessors. Timon, a skeptical philosopher, who lived in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, was undoubtedly the author of Silli. Some of these are dialogues, in which one of the persons is Xenophanes, whence perhaps he was erroneously considered the inventor of this kind of poetry. All the Silli of Timon are epic parodies, and their subject a ludicrous and skeptical attack on philosophy of every kind. Fragments of Silli are preserved by Diogenes, Lucilius, and Chrysostom.—Ad. Alex. Orat. See also Brunck’s Analecta, and Suidas s. vv. σιλλαίνειν, Τίμων.